I'd say I have a few questions, but that should be fairly obvious. Anyway...

First of all, how many tiles from the ocean can a castle be from the ocean and still be able to build ships? Does it have to be immediately adjacent, or does it just have to be within the work radius? For that matter, can it be nowhere near water, and just have the ships spend atrocious amounts of AP getting off the land into the water?

Secondly, is it possible to build road tiles? Not the improvement in cities, but for example, replace plains tiles with roads? This would be useful knowledge for placing cities, because if so, you can use that for movement of troops later quickly, instead of having to worry entirely about balancing resource income vs. ability to gain reinforcements (although this consequently makes being invaded easier).

Finally, is it possible to build towns on forest or mountain tiles, or is it only possible on plains (for that matter, could they be built on a road... Not that forests nor mountains seem to be generated near them... Though they could be used to control tactical locations or be a gold farm)? This one I'd like answered soon, because it'll decide the location of my next town... As soon as I have the AP to move there.

A. AFAIK the location of the city doesn't matter in regards to building machinery.
just FYI even if your city is seaside your ships still cant take shelter in it =(

B. You cant build road tiles
C. You can build on mountains and I imagine forests, though I think deep forests are blocked.

Really? Well that sucks. Guess I'll have to remember not to keep valuable things in my ships unless I'm transporting them somewhere.

As for building on non-deep forests, it's appear you can, since I just did such. ^^; Thanks for the help~

really? thats awesome.. I almost tried it lol...

So is your city invisible? Do bandits spawn around you?

Nyah? I think you misunderstood me. "non-deep forests" as in border forests. Anyway, as for the deep forests adjacent to my town, I don't think it's been long enough to determine if anything spawns, as it's been there for less than a day.

I guess I did.. that's much less awesome!

Just FYI.
You can't upgrade to a Palace if a castle has been built in the deep forests (a.k.a. dark forests). Even if you've upgraded to a Metropolis on a cell that neighbours the deep forests and have a bonus to move the castle, you can't move to that cell.

Huh, that's an odd restriction that's useful to know. Glad I haven't built anything for which that'd be applicable yet.

All restrictions come as a problem solver for a bug or a cheat. It's not that we like to think of ways how to limit the players

Aha! I built my first town in deep forest, and couldn't figure out why I was unable to make it into a Metropolis.

Now I know!! Yes.

I guess I cannot move my city out of the forest as I am surrounded by deep forest.

Humm.... What to do.